Notebooks

Notebooks are snapshots from our writers, reflecting on current affairs and underappreciated aspects of culture and history.

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China and America, the great decoupling

The current trade war is a consequence of successive American presidents' failure to stand up to China as it returned to hardline state control of the economy. The global economy i..

Michael Sheridan April 16, 2025

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America’s republic of bookstores

The classic bookstore is a potent if endangered symbol of what America was meant to be – a republic of small traders and independent thinking.

Phil Tinline April 15, 2025

Cartoon from Punch magazine showing from Roosevelt, Stalin and Churchill at the Yalta Conference in February 1945.

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The political power of knowing your enemy

In war and diplomacy, personal relationships between leaders can shape the course of events in complex and unpredictable ways. Yet those who know their geopolitical adversaries are..

Suzanne Raine April 11, 2025

Demonstrators throw stones at Soviet tanks in Berlin during the East German uprising of June 17 1953.

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What the West can learn from Cold War dissidents

In an age of rising authoritarianism, those who championed democracy from behind the Iron Curtain provide an invaluable source of knowledge and courage.

Elisabeth Braw April 11, 2025

The Bronze Horseman equestrian statue of Peter the Great in St Petersburg.

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A Russian nation struggles to be born

A diplomatic resolution to the war in Ukraine would provide an opportunity for Russia to cease being a revanchist empire and emerge as a normal European country. The geopolitical d..

Thomas Graham April 10, 2025

A Greek lithograph depicting the Young Turk Revolution of 1908.

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How the Young Turks became tyrants

The course of a late-Ottoman revolution warns us that liberators can easily turn into tyrants, and that new political dawns can be deceptive.

Jack Dickens April 9, 2025

US President Donald Trump announces tariffs on all imported vehicles on March 26, 2025.

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Trump’s tariff paradox

Playing the tariff game may undermine Trump’s domestic economic agenda.

Samuel Gregg April 9, 2025

A large crowd of protestors gathered in Gwangju, South Korea.

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South Korea’s crisis could be a geopolitical catastrophe

Amid domestic upheaval and international tensions, South Korea's next president will have to move quickly to mend the country's relationship with the United States and counter thre..

Edward Howell April 8, 2025

A late-19th-century Puck magazine illustration of Joseph Chamberlain holding a pair of shears labelled 'Protection'.

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The Edwardian assault on free trade

At the turn of the 20th century, British protectionists waged a long and unsuccessful crusade against free trade. Like President Trump’s trade policies today, their campaign for ta..

Ioannes Chountis de Fabbri April 7, 2025